Teacher Talk

Archive for April, 2013

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

More Items in English that May Stick. Only Time will Tell.

By Richard FirstenRetired ESOL Teacher, Teacher-Trainer, Columnist

In Part 4 of this series, I presented some quirky things that are happening in English these days, things which I have a hunch may become standard parts of the language or accepted alternative forms in the language as time goes by simply because they’re so commonly spoken, heard, and read by educated native users of English. These quirky things may just be aberrations, but if they’re not, we English teachers may have to accept that they will very likely be taught at some point in the future. Here are some more of these oddities that perhaps won’t be considered so odd down the road.

An interesting observation I’ve made is that even though they’re referring to time, many native speakers use where – which signifies a location, of course – instead of using when, which signifies a time. To me it’s a very odd occurrence, and I can’t figure out why it’s so common. Here are a number of examples:

There was a moment where I knew that I couldn’t do it on my own.

There were instances where she just seemed to drift off into a daydream

Did there come a time where you believed he had done it?

It happened about ten years ago where I found myself wondering why …

One test is called a hand drop. It’s where a neurologist takes the patient’s hand and …

I’m lucky to be in a time where more people champion human rights than ever before.

In each and every example above, it’s clear that when is the appropriate word to use since it deals with time as do all the words preceding where in these sentences. I don’t know if this use of where will ever be considered okay, but that doesn’t mean it won’t continue to be commonly heard.